Inventory Planning Blog

Ease of Use is the Key to Successfully Using Advanced Inventory Planning Solutions

But not for primary forecasting and replenishment planning

Reports and spreadsheets should be used to provide a basic level of information. However, many companies and planners use reports & spreadsheets to completely manage their inventory. To understand the use of these tools on effectiveness and efficiency in inventory planning let’s explore each one independently.

Reports
Many ERP and accounting systems have many standard reports that provide useful information. Usually, however, a company will create or build custom reports either in-house or through their 3rd party IT provider (Value Added Reseller – VAR). OK, so this may help because it provides a level of detail that a company or planner feels is necessary to better manage the inventory.

Assume your outside IT firm builds the report. It costs $5,000 to develop. Let’s also assume it is refreshed, updated, each day. Now what? This is static data and yes it is current but it just sits there and provides no efficiency for the planner. The planner must review and decide what the data suggests and what to do with the data.

But the real cost is much higher than the cost to develop the report. Every report, like spreadsheets must be maintained. Much like a car, the purchase price is just the beginning. Hours of a planner’s time are spent pouring over the results to make decisions. You need to count those hours as an associated cost. So, if a planner is paid say $45,000 per year, plus taxes and benefits the total annual cost is over $50,000. If 35% of a planner’s time is spent reviewing just the reports to manage the inventory, then the first year cost is $5,000 + $17,500 = $22,500. That is some expensive report. Are you getting your money’s worth? You still may not be done.

Most people who have reports will export the data from the report into a spreadsheet so they can better manipulate the data. Here is where the fun comes in.

Spreadsheets
The data from the report is now in the spreadsheet that you spent countless hours creating. The formulas in the cells calculate the numbers you need to evaluate your inventory and plan out the replenishments required.

The dangers inherent in spreadsheets are:
1.    Lack of Control
2.    Errors from:

The vast majority of companies that own an inventory invariably use spreadsheets to control, manage and report. The types of companies vary from manufacturing, to wholesale distribution, to retail, to aftermarket services, to maintenance and repair operations. And this is true geographically and for companies from the very small to the largest. So why the fascination with spreadsheets?

I most cases, companies already own the software as part of a suite or as already installed on the computer they purchased. They are relatively low cost and have an abundance of features that make them attractive. It is also a case of “you don’t know what you don’t know”. Meaning, people are unaware of the availability of easy to use affordable, automated inventory planning software.

The dangers inherent in spreadsheets are:
Lack of Control
Errors from:

How does optimizing your inventory planning impact your savings?

Advanced inventory planning and optimization software in the cloud not only automates the entire planning process, it dramatically increases the positive cash flow of a company. By smartly reducing inventory investment, reducing stockouts, decreasing expedited shipping costs, and reducing planning time all contribute to more available cash. Add to that increased sales and productivity and the gains will also lead to an improved competitive advantage.

Greener Inventory Planning & Optimization

Complex Environment Creates Inventory Challenges

Inventory management has become more challenging in today’s complex and competitive business environment. Yet many companies are still maintaining inventories manually, and  performing complicated computations using spreadsheets and point solutions. Keeping track of reorder points can become an overwhelming task as businesses grow. And standard spreadsheets offer little help in driving down costs and improving revenues because they are time consuming and frequently contain multiple errors. Ray Panko, University of Hawaii compiled data from numerous studies that indicates up to 90% of spreadsheets contain significant errors.

Where is the money hiding?
It is common to find excess and obsolete stock representing thirty-sixty percent of inventory and to find that five-forty percent of the time customer demands cannot be met (based on Valogix’ experience). At worst, companies lose sales; at best, they must ship items at a premium in order to fulfill orders, further driving down the profit margins.

There is good news on the (inventory planning) horizon
Automated planning tools are designed to remove complexity and improve inventory mix. They dramatically reduce the amount of time required to properly plan inventory. By automatically forecasting, replenishing and optimizing, companies can manage inventory more efficiently and meet the demands of customers and suppliers at lower costs for a powerful competitive edge.

Multi-location planning adds complexity.

Service Parts Planning Concepts

Service or spare parts inventory management is a prime candidate for advanced inventory planning, i.e. service management software.  With many parts to manage and a lack of power tools, most companies with parts inventories have too many of the wrong parts.  The result is unnecessary inventory expense, while still suffering service-limiting stock-outs.

Section 179 at a glance - New for 2013 & 2012

•    2013 and 2012 Deduction Limit = $500,000
This is good on new and used equipment, as well as off-the-shelf software.

•    2013 and 2012 Limit on equipment purchases = $2,000,000
This is the maximum amount that can be spent on equipment before the Section 179 Deduction available to your company begins to be reduced.

•    Bonus Depreciation = 50%
This is taken after the $2 million limit in capital equipment purchases is reached. Note: Bonus Depreciation is available for new equipment only. Bonus Depreciation can also be taken by businesses that will have net operating losses in 2013.

The above is an overall, "simplified" view of the Section 179 Deduction for 2013. For more details on limits and qualifying equipment, as well as Section 179 Qualified Financing, please read this entire website carefully.

The Business Problem

Until recently, Small and Mid-size Enterprises (SME) did not have affordable, easy to use software tools to help them effectively manage and balance their inventory investment. Software solutions that forecast, plan and optimize an inventory are found in widespread acceptance in large enterprise companies but these solutions can cost between hundreds of thousands of dollars to millions and are generally not affordable by SMEs.

In most cases, spreadsheets are the common tool in use! They are time-consuming to build and maintain, are usually static data repositories, and according to a study by a major consulting firm over 90% of them contain significant errors.

For organizations that carry an inventory, like manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers, that investment is often their largest asset.  The cost of carrying excess and obsolete stock, as well as not having sufficient saleable inventory to meet demand is enormously high.  It is common to find excess and obsolete stock representing 30% - 60% of inventory and to find that 5% - 40% of the time, customer demand cannot be met. The latter often results in expediting vendor orders at a premium cost that cannot be passed through (based on Valogix’s research and experience).